


"You're Awfully Quiet"

by fannishliss



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Shape of Water (2017)
Genre: International Fanworks Day 2018, Other, spoilers for the movie
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-15
Updated: 2018-02-15
Packaged: 2019-03-19 05:33:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 930
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13697889
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fannishliss/pseuds/fannishliss
Summary: Steve and Bucky talk about the movie.





	"You're Awfully Quiet"

**_This story contains MAJOR SPOILERS for THE SHAPE OF WATER.  If you have not seen that movie, and do want spoilers, do not read this story.   This story is written for International Fanworks Day, with Bucky and Steve talking over the events of The Shape of Water._**  
===

“You’re awfully quiet,” Steve said.  
  
It wasn’t true.  Bucky wasn’t any quieter than he normally was.  It was just that after dinner and a movie Steve’s mouth was usually running a mile a minute.  The unusual silence was on Steve, not Bucky.  
  
“Nah,” Bucky said.  Besides, he was brushing his teeth.  
  
“Did you like the movie?” Steve dared to ask.  
  
It was a racy film – some might say a daring film. But Natasha promised it had a hopeful ending, so Steve and Bucky had gone to see it. The director had a reputation for horror, which wasn’t their thing, but the fantasy elements and the love story were the big appeal.  
  
To tell the truth, the movie had been violent enough to upset Bucky somewhat.  He found the government man’s sadism all too familiar.  Plus the Soviet scientist had been kind of good.  But at least the artist survived, even if the pie boy treated him rotten.  
  
“I liked it,” Bucky said softly.  “I liked the monster.”  
  
Steve nodded, sticking his own tooth brush in his mouth instead of answering.  
  
Bucky spat.  “He was smart, and gentle.  You could tell he loved the girl back.”  
  
“I actually hated that guy Strickland.  Too many of his kind,” Steve said around his toothbrush. “I would have bitten off more than his fingers.”  
  
Biting didn’t always help matters, but sometimes, there was nothing else to do.  
  
“The girl though?   Wowee,” Bucky said. The girl had a lot of nerve, to defy Strickland and do all the daring things she did.  
  
“What about the ending?” Steve asked.  “Do you think the monster went home?”  
  
Bucky shook his head. “How could he go home? He’s in love now, with the girl.  She can’t just swim all the way to South America.”  
  
“Why not?” Steve said.  
  
“She’s just a girl,” Bucky said.  
  
“I would swim to South America for you if I had to,” Steve said, making his moon eyes at Bucky as they climbed into bed.  
  
“Yeah, but you’re a super soldier, not a skinny little girl, even if she was feisty as hell.”  
  
“Do you think he was a god?” Steve asked, as Bucky scootched back into his arms.  
  
“I don’t know,” Bucky said. “Do you think Thor is a god?”  
  
“Thor never brought anyone back to life,” Steve said doubtfully.  
  
“You and me both been brought back to life,” Bucky said. “It happens.”  
  
“Would you though…” Steve said.  “could you fall in love with something, someone so different?”  
  
“Why,” Bucky said, “you thinking of falling in love with a monster?”  
  
Steve frowned and squeezed Bucky a little harder.  “Just because he was different doesn’t mean he was a monster.  He was beautiful in his own way.”  
  
“That’s what the artist guy said.”  
  
“Even though the river guy ate his cat.”  
  
“Too bad about the cat,” Bucky said.  “Pandora.”  
  
“There’s gotta be a hidden meaning there,” Steve said.  
  
“Over my head,” Bucky said.  
  
“I could fall in love,” Steve said, “enough to break a guy free… even if everyone else thought he was a monster, I would see how beautiful he was, how noble and how he deserved to be set free.”  
  
“Hm,” Bucky teased.  “This sounds familiar.  Is this about Thor’s brother again?”  
  
Thor had send them a message that Loki was now considered a hero of Asgard, no longer a renegade or a murderer.  Apparently there was some dire galactic threat that Loki had been trying to outwit for a while now.  
  
“No, it’s not about Thor’s brother,” Steve grumped. “It’s about true love and destiny, and having your inner strengths turn out to be a lot stronger than anyone ever expected.”  
  
“Definitely familiar,” Bucky laughed.  
  
“I want a happier ending,” Steve complained.   “Maybe they could swim as far as the Florida Keys.”  
  
Bucky relented on his logic.  “It’s not like they’d hafta swim all the way to South America in one go.  As long as they make it out of the canal, they can take however long they need.”  
  
“Will she live on raw fish?” Steve thought of another obstacle.  
  
Bucky shrugged.  You could live on next to nothing if you put your mind to it.  
  
“I think they still had plenty of oysters in the Chesapeake back then,” Steve said.  
  
“Maybe a blue crab now and then,” Bucky said, to cheer Steve up.  
  
“I think they’ll make it far enough south that it’s warm all year round, and they’ll open up a tourist show as real live merpeople, and everyone will think it’s fake and it’ll be a sensation.”  
  
“Absolutely,” Bucky said.  Steve was getting quieter, and softer, and his voice was slurring together as he rambled.  
  
“And then they’ll invite their friends to come live with them, and the artist will make the billboards, and the lady with the no-account husband will make them rich with her practical knowledge of the business side of things.”  
  
After a pause, when Bucky thought Steve was finally asleep, Steve added, “And the Russian guy lives, because the river god heals him too…”     
  
Steve always wanted everyone to live.  Except for Strickland, he could die, because he was a bully and Steve hated those.  
  
Bucky nodded off, giving Steve one last goodnight pat, dreaming of the tank, the escape, and healing, and true love ever after.  


End file.
